Thankfully, somebody is writing about the insanity of air-conditioned stores leaving their doors wide open. What does Bloomberg do when there's a heat wave? He saves energy by making city buildings turn up thermostats and shut down elevators. And he does nothing to change the wasteful behavior of the city's stores. [Times] & [Gothamist]

The powerfully cheekboned dog lover on the steps of the Christodora last Friday night was identified as supermodel Noot Seear, according to a commenter here. I don't know from Noot, but apparently she's one of the "New Village People." (More pics of Christodora showdown here.)

Yup, "Yuppie" is back in fashion. Is it just nostalgia for 1988? Or does it carry new meaning? Young Urban Professional doesn't cut it anymore. What do you think Y.U.P. should stand for today in our post-Yuppie age? [Curbed]

Thanks commenter Jill for sitting through that arduous CB3 meeting and letting us know there were plenty of denials for liquor and sidewalk cafe licenses, including (possibly) Frank, who's got the neighbors pissed off about 9 million flinging cell-phone elbows. Hey readers: Who's on your crowding-the-sidewalk shit list? Eater has more info.

Something weird is coming to the EV where a bodega used to be at 2nd Ave and 11th St--looks like a Mexican restaurant outside, with Moroccan-style lamps inside, but filled with many wooden cubicles, each with a computer terminal and an office phone. Hmm, DIY phone-sex biz?

18 comments:

BaHa
said...

Clinton Street Bakery. I've been pummeled, shoved, cursed at, laughed at...for trying to walk on the side of the street that I live on. The clientele treat the area outside the very average restaurant as a living room, pulling plastic chairs out into the middle of the sidewalk, effectively forcing you to walk in the street. Last weekend, I got smacked in the face by a wildly gesticulating Asian tourist.

the morons who invade all of chinatown for the fung wah/gambling buses. it's impossible to walk down the street around departure/arrival time. and if i see one more dazed-looking person who clearly belongs north of houston (or, holy crap, even delancey),wandering aimlessly around my neighborhood with a suitcase, asking where to find the subway, i might just go postal.

I really should not be reading your blog anymore (but i just can't help it) since it just aggravates me more and more and I can't really do anything about it. Just took the half-day off since I'm somewhat not feeling well -- mentally -- upon seeing more yuppies and these "New Village People" coming in the East Village". I guess now I know what you mean by your term "condoschmerz". May Ray Kottner rest in peace, but I just wish that, as his final act, he should have driven his cab onto those crowded sidewalk restaurants/cafe and vanish a few of them new village people.

Nothing beats the shitshow that is Prince Street on any weekend. Ten years ago, it was forgiven, because most of the curbside vendors were artists - and some have even moved up in the world since then. Nowadays, almost all the artists are gone, replaced by Made In China knick-knack vendors and other such crap.

Oh, Son of Sam, a heartbroken city calls out your name! Come restore madness to this unbearable order!

Pretty soon the Big Apple wiil be the Bland Apple, kind of like those apples in an, ahem, "gourmet" store that are all polished bright and shiny and have no taste, or taste like demolished building dust. Yuck!

btw, i spoke with one of the construction guys last week and they told me that 174 second ave. was going to be a real estate office. hideous, it's like they put it together at a fire sale. but they were unpacking a stack of Dell gear, maybe they were telling the truth?

You can see recent votes for approvals and denial of liquor and sidewalk cafe licenses on the CB3 website.

And to all our neighbors: be sure to complain about noise if it's excessive as this does matter when they go for renewal. Also, be aware of who does and doesn't have permits in your neighborhood and complain if you see someone operating without a license.

That Carroll Gardens documentary is interesting, but from my perspective all of BoCoCa (lord help me using that phrase) really retains more of its history than other neighborhoods. For example, Brighton Beach. All signs of the old/Yiddish Brighton Beach are gone nowadays replaced not with Yunnies, but with Russians who kept the neighborhood alive.

Smith Street is filled with Yunnies, but also locals. And while I get sick to think of chains like Lucky Brand Jeans taking over a space that once housed the cool neighborhood bar, "Vegas" it really could be worse.

I walk through Brooklyn Heights and Boerum Hill and Cobble Hill and it still feels like NYC.

Walking down Saint Marks Place in 2008 compared to 1988... Yeesh. It's just chain stores and junk and not worth the effort.

thanks jill--i totally agree with you, we all have to police these places. the more people complain, the more we will be heard. i totally support becoming 311 cranks. 311--one of the few good ideas bloomberg brought to the city.

OK,I miss the drug dealers, at least they didn't block the sidewalk and they had enough respect to move out of the way and not to bad vibe you. And junkies, at least you knew what they were about, and the squatters, yeah, you could smell them, but they weren't rude and treated the neighborhood people with respect. Then the old slumlords sold the buildings to these new breed of slumlords, who's getting rid of the old East Villagers' with their rent stablized apts. and replacing them with these new, mannerless, rude, clueless, acting like the world owes them something, new residents. Maybe cause their paying 4 times the rent for an apt. that was less that $700 1 year ago.I wouldn't doubt if someday someone goes postal in the East Village someday just because how these new rude asses take up the whole sidewalk when they go down the street together.But...I guess they call it progress.

"Jeremiah Moss does an excellent job of cataloging all that’s constantly being sacrificed to the god of rising rents." --Hugo Lindgren, New York Times Magazine

"No one takes stock of New York's changes with the same mixture of snark, sorrow, poeticism, and lyric wit as Jeremiah Moss... Even as the changes he's cataloging break our hearts a little, it's that kind of lovely, precise writing that makes Moss's blog essential reading." --Village Voice, Best of NY

“Jeremiah Moss…is the defender of all the undistinguished hunks of masonry that lend the streets their rhythm.” --Justin Davidson, New York Magazine

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